Brat is the sixth studio album by English singerCharli XCX, released through Atlantic Records on 7 June 2024. The album features production from her longtime executive producer A. G. Cook, in addition to Finn Keane, Cirkut, her partner George Daniel, Charli XCX herself, and others. The album's pop sound draws on the 2000s rave music scene of her teenage years, balancing an aggressive and brash attitude with moments of vulnerability.
The album received widespread acclaim from music critics, debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and reached the top ten in twelve additional countries, including the United States, where it debuted at number three, her highest-debuting album to date. According to Metacritic, it is the highest-rated album of 2024 and the 104th-highest-rated album of all time as of July 2024[update]. A deluxe edition with three additional tracks was released on 10 June 2024.
Brat is Charli XCX's sixth studio album and first after renewing her contract with Atlantic Records in early 2023.[2][3] It was announced on 28 February 2024, a day before the release of the lead single "Von Dutch", which was released on 29 February.[4][5]
According to Charli XCX, Brat is her "most aggressive and confrontational record", but also her most vulnerable.[6] On 22 February, during her Boiler Room warehouse set, she debuted snippets of tracks identified as "Spring Breakers" and "365".[7] She was joined on the stage by Addison Rae and Julia Fox;[8] a "Von Dutch" remix with Rae and A. G. Cook was released on 22 March.[9] On 6 March, she premiered "So I" at the Billboard Women in Music event.[10] "Club Classics" and "B2B" were released on 3 April as a two-pack promotional single.
After teasing the song for a few days, on 29 April, Charli announced the release of the next single, "360". It was released on 10 May alongside its music video, which was teased earlier that day, and was described by her as "[her] best music video ever". The music video features multiple "it girls",[11] including Gabbriette, Chloë Sevigny, Julia Fox, and Rachel Sennott.[12] A remix of "360" soon followed, featuring Swedish artists Robyn and Yung Lean, which was released on 31 May.[13]
Brat was released on 7 June 2024.[14] A deluxe edition, titled Brat and It's the Same But There's Three More Songs So It's Not, was released on 10 June containing three extra original songs.[15] On 21 June, a remix version of "Girl, So Confusing" featuring New Zealand singer Lorde was released.[16]
Brat channels the illegal Londonrave scene where Charli XCX started performing when she was a teenager.[17] She also mentioned that Brat "is probably the closest album to Pop 2 in its ethos".[18] It has been described as consisting of electropop,[19]club-pop,[6]hyperpop,[20]electroclash,[21] and dance styles.[22] As Charli XCX told Billboard's Katie Bain, Brat is produced from a tight collection of sounds to create "this unique minimalism that is very loud and bold".[17]The Face's Shaad D'Souza compared the album's sound to 2000s-era Ministry of Sound compilations The Annual and Rihanna's 2010 album Loud, describing the lyrics as "shady and bratty, but tender and heartbreaking".[6]
Charli XCX has confirmed that one track from the album, "Girl, So Confusing," explores her contentious relationship with a fellow female artist. Listeners speculated that the track was about Marina Diamandis, Rina Sawayama, or Lorde; the latter appeared on the remix version of the song.[23][16] "Sympathy Is a Knife" alludes to another similar situation; the song has been speculated to be written about her relationship with Taylor Swift, as well as Charli's perception of her relationship with the 1975's lead singer, Matty Healy.[24] "Mean Girls", a song partially inspired by Red Scare co-host Dasha Nekrasova and actress and singer Julia Fox, focuses on society's "fascination with mean girls".[6]The Face described the track "So I" as "a knotty exploration of her grief about [the death of] Sophie".[25][26][6] "Apple" was written with inspiration from the writing style of Charli XCX's close friend and collaborator Caroline Polachek.[27] "I Think About It All The Time" sees Charli XCX contemplating motherhood after meeting her friend and collaborator Noonie Bao's baby.[28][29] In an interview prior to Brat's release, she stated "am I less of a woman if I don’t have a kid? Will I feel like I’ve missed out on my purpose in life? I know we’re not supposed to say that, but it’s this biological and social programming.”
Brat's deluxe version adds three new songs. "Hello Goodbye" was described as "crush-addled".[30] On "Guess", Charli XCX challenges a subject to guess the color of her underwear, which critics described as "unapologetically flirty and suggestive".[31] "Spring Breakers" suggests that Charli XCX's edginess bars her from music industry events such as the Grammy Awards.[32]
Anticipating the release of Brat, the cover art of her discography was updated across streaming platforms to match its appearance.
Brat's cover artwork and packaging was designed by New York City-based studio Special Offer, Inc.[33] The cover, a low resolution lime green square with the title disproportionately imposed on it, was met with criticism. In a cover story interview for Vogue Singapore, she told Chandreyee Ray that the criticism led her to question why fans feel "ownership over female artists" so much so that they demand their photograph be on all of their work; she had previously dubbed it "mysoginistic [sic] and boring" on X (formerly Twitter). She further explained the album cover and particularly the colour choice, deeming green heavily oversaturated in the media and fashion "as of late": "I wanted to go with an offensive, off-trend shade of green to trigger the idea of something being wrong. I'd like for us to question our expectations of pop culture—why are some things considered good and acceptable, and some things deemed bad? I'm interested in the narratives behind that and I want to provoke people. I'm not doing things to be nice".[34]
In the weeks leading up to Brat's release, a wall in Greenpoint, Brooklyn—henceforth dubbed the "brat wall"—was constantly painted and repainted with the album's signature green color (and sometimes white). Over the course of the summer, its messages changed frequently in line with the album's promotion cycle. The first message was "i'm your fav reference"—a lyric from the single "360"—before it was repainted to simply "brat". On June 10, the day which Brat's deluxe edition was released, the wall was changed to the color white with the message "brat and it’s the same but there’s three more songs so it’s not". By the middle of June, the wall remained white but changed its message to "lorde", indicating the New Zealand singer's possible involvement with future releases pertaining to Brat, which would soon quickly result in the remix version of "Girl, So Confusing". The final message of the Brat wall—"ok bye!" in the album's signature green—was painted on July 1.[35]
According to the review aggregator Metacritic, Brat received "universal acclaim" based on a weighted average score of 95 out of 100 from 24 critic scores.[37] The website's report reads, "Critics have embraced the album's rave-influenced sound that eliminates some of the accessibility (and guest stars) of prior album Crash in favor of a rawer, grittier, and more sophisticated sound that is no less fun. Club classic, indeed." As of July 2024[update], it ranks as the highest-rated album of 2024[46] and the 104th-highest-rated album of all time on the website.[47] The review aggregator site AnyDecentMusic? compiled 28 reviews and gave the album an average of 8.7 out of 10.[36] Critics praised Charli XCX's emotional vulnerability and several declared Brat to be one of her best albums,[48][43][49][50] with Laura Snapes of The Guardian calling it a masterpiece.[40]
Sal Cinquemani of Slant Magazine described the album as "bratty and brash" but "frequently vulnerable".[45] Brittany Spanos of Rolling Stone wrote that Brat was a "hyperpop rollercoaster of post-Saturn return, early-thirties anxieties, and It-girl bravado".[20] Ben Tipple from DIY saw the album as a manifestation of the singer's rave roots, dubbing it "an unmistakable representation of her very core; an exhilarating ode to the multiple facets of club culture".[51]
Meaghan Garvey of Pitchfork lauded the album as "substantial in new ways for Charli" and gave it the distinction of Best New Music.[52] Writing for Paste, Eric Bennett praised the album and described it as "messy and vulnerable... in a way Charli's work has lacked over the last decade".[21] Vera Maksymiuk of RIFF Magazine wrote that "whether on punchy and sassy single "Von Dutch" or on more stripped-back songs like "I think about it all the time"...you can feel SOPHIE watching over her, guiding her and coaxing her out of her creative comfort zone, as she did in life."[53]
In the United Kingdom, Brat debuted at number two (selling 27,234 units) on the UK Albums Chart, behind Taylor Swift's The Tortured Poets Department (2024), earning Charli her second top ten charting album and her biggest opening week sales in the country.[54][55] This sparked controversy among media outlets who accused Swift of hogging the number one spot in the UK by releasing a new version of her most recent album, available only in the UK, the same week that 'Brat' was released.[56]
In the US, Brat debuted at number three on the Billboard 200 with 77,000 album-equivalent units sold on its opening week, consisting of 40,000 pure album sales. With this feat, it became Charli's highest charting album in the country. It also earned Charli her highest first week overall sales and her biggest streaming week ever with 46.72 million streams.[57]
People's Sadie Bell linked the album cover with the nature of the album, which Charli XCX dubbed "confrontational".[58] Dubbed the "Brat summer" trend, the style of album cover and the specific shade of green became a viral sensation after a "Brat generator" tool surfaced online which allowed users to replicate the cover with their own custom text.[59][60][61][62] The London Eye landmark was lit up in lime green on the day of the album's release.[63] As part of their 2024 election campaign, the Green Party of England and Wales posted a replica of the album cover to social media which read "vote green" instead of "brat".[64]
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